A recent tragedy lies at the intersection of two of America’s most pernicious trends: social media and out-of-control crime.
Four teenagers were killed Monday in Buffalo, New York, after the stolen Kia they were riding in crashed, WIVB-TV reported.
Police believe that the teens may have taken the car as part of the “Kia Challenge” TikTok trend, where videos shared to the platform walk the viewers through ways to start certain models of the South Korean company’s vehicles and some Hyundais using household items like a USB cable and a screwdriver.
Law enforcement has urged vehicle owners to take additional steps to secure these cars after seeing an increase in auto theft for these vulnerable models.
The 16-year-old who was driving the Kia Sportage at the time of the crash has been charged with criminal possession of stolen property and unauthorized use of a vehicle, the Buffalo News reported.
He’s set to appear in court Friday after his hearing was moved up from the original Nov. 15 summons date.
A 14-year-old passenger involved in the incident was listed in good condition at Erie County Medical Center.
The driver was the only one of the six inside the vehicle not ejected through the vehicle’s sunroof.
According to WGRZ-TV, one of the deceased was identified as Ahjanae Harper, who was just a week shy of her 15th birthday and recently became the mother of a baby daughter.
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“The tragedy of the crash on the Scajaquada killed 4 young people,” WGRZ-TV journalist Claudine Ewing tweeted with a video of a man remembering the teen.
“I’m learning more about the victims. The 14 y/o was a mother,” Ewing added.
“She was a young mother,” the unidentified man recounted of Harper.
“She just had a daughter a few months old,” he said, adding that Harper “definitely spent a lot of time with her daughter.”
The tragedy of the crash on the Scajaquada killed 4 young people. I’m learning more about the victims. The 14 y/o was a mother @WGRZ pic.twitter.com/LDZY6ldAm7
— Claudine Ewing (@ClaudineWgrz) October 25, 2022
The others killed in the crash included 16-year-old Kevin Payne, 17-year-old Swazine Swindle and 19-year-old Marcus Webster.
If these young people were indeed spurred on by a TikTok challenge, it wouldn’t be the first time that social media was implicated in influencing America’s youth to their own demise.
It’s almost tempting to wax nostalgic about the halcyon days when it was just a few silly youngsters ingesting Tide Pods, who were perhaps the kind of kids who would have engaged in such reckless behavior anyway.
Nowadays, young people on social media are barraged with messaging that is counter to a healthy, happy life.
They are encouraged into gender confusion that can lead them down a dark, twisted road to medication, bodily mutilation and the lifelong heartache that comes with it.
Their lives are no longer occupied the flesh and blood of their families and their peers, but rather by flickering screens filled with objectionable content brought to them by the nefarious algorithms of social media companies.
Simultaneously, they’re being raised in a society that excuses rather than punishes those who commit crimes, thus taking away any disincentive to dangerous illegal behavior.
Teenagers have always done stupid and risky things.
The difference now is that society no longer cares enough to protect them from their own worst instincts.
